Funeral honors slain Duxbury children as mother faces charges (2024)

The lives of the three Duxbury children who were allegedly slain by their mother last month were honored at a funeral service Friday, news outlets reported.

The private funeral for 5-year-old Cora Clancy, 3-year-old Dawson Clancy and 7-month-old Callan Clancy was held at St. Mary of the Nativity in Scituate on Friday, WCVB reported. The service was co-led by Rev. Bob Deehan, who baptized the youngest boy, Callan Clancy, in October of last year, according to the Boston Herald.

“It was a beautiful funeral mass, but it’s very, very difficult,” Deehan said, according to WCVB.

• Read more: Lindsay Clancy’s attorney says number of drugs she was prescribed ‘stunning’

Thirty-two-year-old Lindsay Clancy, the children’s mother, faces homicide and strangulation charges in connection with Cora and Dawson Clancy’s deaths at their home on Summer Street in Duxbury on Jan. 24, Plymouth District Attorney Timothy Cruz’s office has stated.

Lindsay Clancy is also suspected of wounding her youngest son, Callan Clancy, before trying to take her own life. The mother and infant were brought to the hospital, but the baby died three days later, only a day after turning 8 months old. The district attorney’s office has yet to announce additional charges for the mother as of Feb. 4; however, upgraded charges are expected following the infant’s death, WCVB reported.

The deaths of the three children, allegedly at the hands of their mother, have made national news and stunned those in the Duxbury community, a quiet South Shore town, who have described the Clancy family as loving and happy.

• Read more: GoFundMe tops $1 million for Patrick Clancy, father of 3 Duxbury children killed

At a candlelight vigil held at the Holy Family Church in Duxbury on Jan. 26 to grieve the lost lives of Cora and Dawson Clancy and pray for Callan Clancy, who had not yet died, Deehan noted that “all of us here in Duxbury are beyond devastated and heartbroken.” Before the tragedy that unfolded on Jan. 24, Lindsay Clancy and her husband, Patrick Clancy, were a “loving, happy couple and family,” the reverend said.

Deehan, the reverend at the Holy Family Church, told WCVB he read a eulogy written by Patrick Clancy at Friday’s funeral.

“Showing the beautiful relationship he had with each child and brought out their personality and the dynamic between himself and the child, and it was beautiful,” Deehan said, according to WCVB. “Beautiful and a privilege for me to read it for him, but not easy at the same time.”

• Read more: Duxbury mother Lindsay Clancy’s husband says he forgives wife, accused of killing their three children

Patrick Clancy has said he forgives his wife for her alleged actions. Matthew Glaser, an extended family member who created a GoFundMe page that has raised more than $1 million in support of the medical bills and funeral services the husband has to pay, posted a statement from Patrick Clancy in which he talked about the devastation of losing his three children and described them in loving terms.

“Callan died with enormous courage despite being so little. Maybe it was his way of demonstrating what I need to do to press forward. I’ll always try to draw inspiration from him. He’ll always be my little hero,” the statement said.

The husband also asked the public to forgive Lindsay Clancy, noting how he already has. He also described how his wife had a “condition” that “rapidly worsened,” though he did not specify what condition she had.

“The real Lindsay was generously loving and caring towards everyone - me, our kids, family, friends, and her patients. The very fibers of her soul are loving. All I wish for her now is that she can somehow find peace,” Patrick Clancy said.

• Read more: After Duxbury tragedy, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler visits Plymouth dispatch center

On Friday, Attorney Kevin Reddington, who is representing Lindsay Clancy, called the number of medications she was prescribed “stunning.”

“She was clearly overmedicated on top of that state of mind that she was in either from postpartum psychosis or postpartum depression,” Reddington said about Lindsay Clancy.

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MassLive reporters Kiernan Dunlop, Luis Fieldman and Tom Matthews contributed to this report.